Q and A with Which? Legal Service

[RachelMumsnet]

Want to know more about your employment rights?

Are you are currently on maternity leave and want to better understand your rights? Or are you worried about redundancy? Or perhaps you?re working full-time and want to know if you have the right to ask to work part-time? Which? Legal Service could help.

Which? Legal Service offers unbiased expert legal advice from our team of qualified lawyers and employment advisors. Because they are part of Which?, they take no advertising or sponsorship and are completely independent, not for profit and a registered charity. Their profits go directly into our campaigning work to help fight for consumer rights.

Which? team of lawyers are on hand to answer your employment legal queries.
Post your comments and questions here by Wednesday 24th May and they will do their best to answer as many questions as possible.

[FutureMum]

Hello,

I am currently pregnant and at risk of redundancy within 2 months (as part of restructure). Desperately trying to compete for internal roles. My questions are:
What rights have I got if I am unsuccessful and made redundant this summer? (currently pregnant but not on maternity leave). I would qualify to take mat leave before my redundancy comes into effect - I have heard of the Maternity & Paternity etc regulations, which my employer seems to be ignoring with other colleagues. Is this legal? Would I gain any extra rights re: being offered alternative suitable vacancies if I was to go on mat leave before the date my redundancy comes into effect?
Thank you, keep up the good work.

[Sonnet]

Hello,
I currently work 4 days per week and have done for 8 years now. I am under pressure from my boss/the company to incresse to 5 days. This is not due to an increase in work as I curently do not have enough to do to fill 4.

Do they have to get my agreement to increase to 4?, can they force it ie take it or leave it or could I argue that my current role is "redundant"
Thanks you!

[doihavetopayitback]

Previously posted this in employment and had some replies. Would like more information about the recovery process and when (if at all) this debt will become statue barred.
My current circumstances are that I am being supported by my new partner and am soon to become a student for 3 years. Therefore there is no money spare to make any repayments.

Scenario:
Due to a huge mistake by my previous line manager I was overpaid nearly £1000 by my employer last year.

She rang to tell me after an audit picked it up and I said I hadnt received payslip so hadnt had a chance to look at breakdown but was surprised at amount of pay.

My housing benefit was stopped because of the pay and I had to fight and undergo alot of stress to get a letter from HR detailing what I should have been paid. Eventually 3 months later my HB was paid but I nearly lost my home because of her mistake.

I have not received anything offical from my employer regarding paying it back and I verbally asked them to write it off and I would be in hardship to pay it back. Plus due to all the stress and upset I felt they should also consider writing it off. I had to make phone calls every other day to either my line manger, her line manager, HR or housing benefits. I may as well have been off sick and recieving sick pay as it had a terrible effect on my health.

I am now on an unpaid career break from work and HR have said verbally they would ask for it to be paid back when I return/or resign (which is about 3yrs away minimum and I could extend this to 5 years and I am very tempted to do so) They would look at hardship when they request repayment. However my circumstance now are hardship and if they considered it now I think they would have to allow it...I think they are delaying so they are in a stronger position.

My question is what rights do I have? The only letter I have received is one detailing what I was paid in error and what I should have received. I think it says they will contact me shortly regarding repayment....and that was 7mths ago.

When I receive my P60 I expect the gross pay will include the overpaid amount. I have had to give Tax credits the amount shown on month 12 payslip (which includes the overpayment)

[doihavetopayitback]

BTW the letter I received detailing amounts of OP etc was at my insistance as I needed it for housing benefit

[Attenborough]

It looks as though my job may be transferred to another company under TUPE at the end of the year. I know that I'm entitled to everything that's in my contract of employment, apart from pension rights, but what about policies which aren't specifically included in the contract, like maternity? Would a new company be required to uphold the old company's maternity benefits, even if I'm not pregnant at the time of the transfer?

[Jcee]

Hi

I'm currently on maternity leave due to return to work in December.

My employer has just announced that they are relocating most (but not all) of my team to another office which is 50 miles away.

It is unclear which posts will remain in our current office and which will be moved to the new location but my employer has stressed it will only be a handful of posts which stay at the current office and so most people should expect to move.

I'm unclear of my rights with regard to my return to work and location. Also if I don't want to move to the new location, when does a relocation become grounds for redundancy?

Thanks in advance

[BigBadMummy]

I run a company where all the people who complete tasks for me are self employed.

I send them the job request, they complete the task and then invoice me, and I pay them.

I suspect that for some of those self employed people I am their only source of income (ie they do not look for work elsewhere). This concerns me.

Should I be worried? And insist they find additional work elsewhere or will the Revenue assume I am trying to avoid employing them.

Which I am not!

[sillysow]

I am currently on Maternity Leave for a full 52 weeks. The last 3 months are unpaid in respect of SMP and company Maternity Pay.

Is there anything to stop me doing a small amount of casual work in order to get by, so long as it is taxed in the usual way?

[CaptainNancy]

I am v interested in legal position re overpayments too. I have chased with HR many times now, so has my manager. They haven't sorted it out. Its gone into a new tax year, so my tax will be paid wrong on it etc etc.
Can I keep it after a certain period? My manager has left now too... no new one appointed, and may not be due to public sector staffing freeze.

[pixiestix]

Hello,

I'm going on Maternity leave in the autumn, and I am entitled to 22 weeks full pay, then 17 weeks SMP. My boss has told me that I will only qualify for holiday pay/leave for the 17 weeks SMP, not for the 22 weeks before that. Our holiday year runs from Jan-Dec, and we get 28 days. I will have used 20 of these by the time my leave starts, and will lose the 8 others, according to my boss.
Does this sound right?

Its only a small company, (and she is in charge of all the HR stuff) so she has told me that there is no maternity policy to view, and that I will get all the information I need at 25 weeks when I hand in my MATB1. So I have nothing in writing to either back up or contradict what she says.

Thank you very much for any advice you can give!

[sianimac]

I work shifts. My boss often pressures us to change shifts at very short notice. Legally how much notice do employers need to give if they insist that employees must shift swap?
How far in advance should a rota be recieved?

[flowerybeanbag]

[UserNameAngst]

Does my company have to give me the 7 bank holidays that were during my ordinary maternity leave?My contract gives me 24 days and bank holidays are counted separately. Thanks for an advice!

[kittya]

My aunt is a carer in the community and due to retire in two years. She has a new boss. Early last year she was accused of stealing a statue from an elderly client and was suspended pending investigations, the statue was then found in the old ladies house and my aunt received a full written apology. Now, someone has accused her of swearing at a client (she doesnt even swear in RL) and been rude, the old lady cant remember which carer it was but said she had blonde hair (my aunt has blondish hair, as do alot of people) her new boss has taken it upon herself to say that it was my aunt and has officially recorded this. It is very upsetting and stressful, as you can imagine. The boss got her in the office and said "thats two incidents on your record now, one more and you are out" this is after 25 years of impeccable service? what should my aunt do? she works for the council. She has been trying to get intouch with her union rep for two weeks and he has never rang her back. She is really suffering and fragile. Any advice would be much appreciated. Thanks.

[angelaspangela]

I was made redundant at Christmas and have been doing freelance consultancy since then. I want to get pregnant. How does maternity allowance for self-employed people work? What period do they use to calculate the allowance?

[RibenaBerry]

[flowerybeanbag]

Ribena

v frustrating!

[ilovemydogandMrObama]

[flowerybeanbag]

Hi ilove

[RibenaBerry]

Hi!

[coveredinsnot]

If I am undergoing medical tests (e.g. with a cardiologist) am I obliged to tell my employer about this, even before test results come through? And once they do come through, am I obliged to tell them about the results as well?
Thanks so much.

[ceeebeee]

A colleague and I, both on maternity leave, have been made redundant. I am convinced that we were targeted specifically, though of course the company deny this. When I asked to see my scores, I realised, firstly, that there were some selection criteria that the employee rep (>20 jobs went in company in total) had not made me aware of, and secondly, that there were selection criteria such as current need/business need. I scored really low on this - obviously wasn't working on any projects while on maternity leave, so my manager had to give me a score based on whether they felt the business needed me. I can't see how this is an objective criterion - is this fair?

They also had been deducting my childcare vouchers from my SMP - I queried this before my redundancy and it was only after I appealed my redundancy and added this to the appeal that they've agreed to refund this money, though they're saying that I'm at fault because I still wanted childcare vouchers while on maternity leave. Is this true? They're also wanting to tax this money - if this is a childcare voucher payment surely it isn't meant to be taxed?

[cymrumam]

I am employed on a full time contract from tuesday to saturday - so hence it is very rare that my working week falls on a bank holiday. I queried this a couple of years ago as my colleague works mon to friday and had the same holiday entitlement obviously got all the bank holidays off and they upped my holiday entitlement from 20 to 24 days as a result.

My original contract states
"You will be entitled to 20 days holiday per annum "

"You are entitled to all recognised public holidays in England and Wales.

Such holidays shall be granted with full pay"

Should I therefore now be entitled to 28 days plus bank holidays ? Or is it as I get now 24 days plus relevant bank holidays when they fall on a working day?